Scottish Executive

Animal Disease Surveillance

Alex Fergusson (Galloway and Upper Nithsdale) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive what research has been carried out into incidences of bovine tuberculosis in the badger population and whether further research is planned.

Ross Finnie: No such research has been undertaken, or is planned in Scotland. The State Veterinary Service in Scotland monitors the tuberculosis situation closely. There is no evidence to date of unexplained local spread or recrudescence of disease, which we would expect to see if a wildlife vector was involved in disease transmission.

Asylum Seekers

Pauline McNeill (Glasgow Kelvin) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive what measures it is taking to integrate dispersed asylum seekers into local communities.

Ms Margaret Curran: The Executive has provided around £2 million of funding since September 2001 for a range of projects which assist asylum seekers to integrate into the local community. These include facilities such as drop in centres, language classes and child care provision and the Framework for Dialogue project being run by the Scottish Refugee Council in partnership with Glasgow City Council and the Glasgow Council for the Voluntary Sector. In addition we have spent a further £3 million on language services and on implementing the Scottish Refugee integration Forum Action Plan.

Audit Scotland

Fergus Ewing (Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive how much has been paid by Audit Scotland in respect of VAT in each year since inception.

Mr Andy Kerr: Audit Scotland is a statutory body independent of the Scottish Executive. The Executive does not provide accounting services to Audit Scotland. Such questions should be addressed to the Auditor General for Scotland.

Audit Scotland

Fergus Ewing (Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it has made written representations to HM Customs and Excise regarding Audit Scotland's VAT status and, if so, whether copies of such representations will be placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre.

Mr Andy Kerr: Audit Scotland is a statutory body independent of the Scottish Executive. The Executive does not have responsibility for VAT matters relating to Audit Scotland. Such questions should be addressed to the Auditor General for Scotland.

Carers

Mr Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD): To ask the Scottish Executive what plans it has to underpin and augment financial support for home-based respite care in north and west Sutherland.

Mr Tom McCabe: The resources allocated by the Executive to local authorities to support carers, including resources to develop respite services, have risen from £5 million in 1999-2000 to £21 million in 2003-04. The local government allocations for the next three years maintain these resources at the 2003-04 levels, augmented by the general uplift for pay and inflation. Ultimately, it is a matter for Highland Council how to spend its share of these resources and to determine how much it spends on respite services.

Flood Prevention

Des McNulty (Clydebank and Milngavie) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive what provision has been identified to deal with flooding affecting Clydebank; whether a range of options have been identified for this provision, and when decisions are likely to be taken to commit any necessary resources.

Allan Wilson: It is for the relevant local authority, in this case West Dunbartonshire Council, to determine whether provision is required to deal with flooding in its area. However, I am aware that local authorities in the catchment of the River Clyde are presently investigating flood risk from the river and options to address that risk. So far, no formal proposals for flood prevention schemes for the River Clyde, nor for Clydebank, have been submitted to the Executive.

  Decisions on the provision of financial resources to manage flood risk can only be taken once a statutory flood prevention scheme has been confirmed by ministers.

Health

Mr Andrew Welsh (Angus) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what action it is taking in respect of any health risks from the installation of terrestrial trunked radio masts near schools.

Malcolm Chisholm: TETRA systems are subject to the same provisions for control of public exposures to radiofrequency (RF) radiation as global system for mobile telecommunications (GSM) equipment. These provisions include a requirement that operators ensure that public exposures are kept within the guideline levels defined by the international commission on non-ionizing radiation protection (ICNIRP). To monitor compliance with this requirement, the Radiocommunications Agency (RA) is undertaking an audit of base stations with particular emphasis on those near schools and hospitals. The general finding of the RA audit is that levels of RF radiation exposure are thousands of times below the ICNIRP public exposure guideline level. For example, the highest measured exposure level for the 21 Scottish school inspections carried out so far this year (and published on the RA website at www.radio.gov.uk ) was less than one five-thousandth of the ICNIRP public exposure guideline level. The measurement programme in Scotland has not yet been extended to include TETRA emissions but the RA propose to make appropriate changes to cover these emissions as TETRA base stations become operational.

Identity Cards

Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will allow NHS records to be incorporated in UK identity cards.

Mr Andy Kerr: The Executive has no plans to incorporate Scottish NHS records in the proposed UK identity cards.

Identity Cards

Colin Fox (Lothians) (SSP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will introduce voluntary entitlement cards for its services and, if so, whether these will be different from any UK identity cards.

Mr Andy Kerr: The Executive has no plans to introduce a voluntary entitlement card for services directly delivered by the Scottish Executive.

  The Executive is supporting a number of local authorities in the development of a voluntary citizen's entitlement card for their services including cashless catering in schools, school registration, concessionary fares and access to leisure and library services amongst others.

  Our partnership agreement confirms we will evaluate the local pilot projects in order to assess the desirability of creating a national voluntary citizen's entitlement card for appropriate public services.

Justice

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD): To ask the Scottish Executive how the courts will be involved in decisions about tagging released offenders.

Hugh Henry: Section 40 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2003 provides that where a person is released from custody on licence, Scottish ministers may include a remote monitoring condition in the licence. In the great majority of cases such a condition would be inserted following a binding recommendation from the Parole Board. As such, the courts will not be involved in decisions about tagging released offenders. The relevant provisions will be commenced in January 2004.

Maternity Services

Carolyn Leckie (Central Scotland) (SSP): To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-3774 by Malcolm Chisholm on 14 November 2003, whether additional funding to the ambulance service in the NHS Argyll and Clyde area was allocated specifically to take account of any increase in demand and any higher likelihood of births in transit.

Malcolm Chisholm: Some of the additional funding will be used by the Scottish Ambulance Service to respond to the changes to the nature of demand on the service arising from the review of maternity services in the area.

NHS Equipment

Shona Robison (Dundee East) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive when the next planned wave of modernisation and enhancement of radiotherapy equipment is due for completion so that 24 linear accelerators will be provided.

Malcolm Chisholm: It is estimated that the expansion to 24 fully commissioned and operational linear accelerators will be complete by 2005-06.

NHS Staff

Ms Sandra White (Glasgow) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what action will be taken to address issues relating to the pension rights of speech and language therapists after 2011 under the Agenda for Change .

Malcolm Chisholm: Discussions will be taking place with the Scottish Public Pensions Agency to ensure that measures are put in place with a view to ensuring that any NHS staff on protection under Agenda for Change on a mark time basis will not lose out in pension payments in future.

NHS Staff

Ms Sandra White (Glasgow) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what action it will take to address the increase in the working hours of speech and language therapists under the Agenda for Change .

Malcolm Chisholm: Nationally, speech and language therapists work unconditioned hours and in some cases locally hours exceed the new standard of 37.5 hours proposed under Agenda for Change . In this context, alongside the standard hours of 37.5, Agenda for Change provides for out of hours and, separately, unsocial hours rewards. These terms are currently not in the national agreements for speech and language therapists.

National Health Service

Ms Sandra White (Glasgow) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what the reason is for replacing the mechanism for patients to receive independent advice from health councils with the use of agencies appointed through NHS boards.

Malcolm Chisholm: Our aim is that individuals who wish to complain should have ready access to a suitable source of independent advice and support set up for this purpose. Local health councils, which are appointed by NHS boards, do already offer help to individuals who approach them, but they do so to a varying extent.

  We will therefore ask NHS boards to ensure that a suitable source of independent advice and support is set up for this purpose. Proposals will need to be agreed with the Scottish Health Council, which should be represented on the commissioning group and be involved in monitoring its effectiveness.

National Health Service

Ms Sandra White (Glasgow) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether chief executives of NHS trusts are to be allowed to opt out of the Agenda for Change process and what the reasons are for its position on this matter.

Malcolm Chisholm: Agenda for Change proposals, if agreed, will apply in full to all staff directly employed by NHS organisations, except very senior managers and staff within the remit of the Doctor's and Dentists' Review Body. This is the position across the UK. Chief executives in small trusts whose job weight is under 720 points will be covered by Agenda for Change . There will be separate arrangements for chief executives, directors at board level and senior posts with a job weight over 720 points after job evaluation.

National Health Service

Shona Robison (Dundee East) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive how many clinics on the NHS Scotland waiting times website are for urgent referrals only and, of these, how many clinics have waiting times of less than four weeks for nine out of 10 patients, broken down by speciality and NHS board area.

Malcolm Chisholm: Out-patient clinics which deal solely with urgent referrals, such as fracture clinics, are not included in the national waiting times database because patients who access such clinics generally do so for emergency assessment and treatment and not through referral by their GPs.

  The information provided on the database (now available on the web at http://www.show.scot.nhs.uk/waiting/) is the expected waiting time (90th percentile) for a routine appointment at each consultant-led out-patient clinic, following a GP referral. During the pilot period earlier this year, GPs indicated that this information was most relevant to them and to patients, when considering referrals.

National Health Service

Shona Robison (Dundee East) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive how it has publicised the NHS Scotland waiting times website; what NHS Scotland documents publicise the website, and what other websites have links to the NHS Scotland waiting times website.

Malcolm Chisholm: It is very important that people in Scotland know about the national waiting times database so that they and their GPs can use the information it contains to guide decisions about referrals to out-patient clinics. That is why our publicity material such as posters and leaflets is concentrated on GP practices.

  In addition, NHS Health Department Letter (2003) 54, issued on 30 October 2003, (available at http://www.show.scot.nhs.uk/publicationsind\ex.htm) provides guidance on the use of the database to NHS boards and trusts and local health councils.

  The database is accessible via the Scotland Health on the Web (SHOW) homepage at www.show.scot.nhs.uk. A large number of links to this page are available, including on the Scottish Executive website at:

  http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/?pageID=122.

Regulation of Care

Campbell Martin (West of Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive, in light of changes to the method of payment of care home fees and the withdrawal of direct payment of residential allowance to clients, whether it will ensure that sufficient funding is provided to local authorities so that no shortfall in funding will occur and that no local authority will be required to make savings in its social services budget in order to reallocate funding to cover the new system.

Mr Tom McCabe: Residential allowance for new care home residents was stopped in April 2002, as recommended by the Royal Commission on Long Term Care. The residential care financial assessment ensures that care home residents are no worse off as a result of receiving less benefit income. Instead, they simply make a smaller contribution to the local authority towards their fees. Additional funding was transferred from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and distributed to local authorities to meet the consequent reduction in their income.

  This October, residential allowance was withdrawn from those remaining residents who had still been receiving it since before April 2002. Additional resources to meet the consequent reduction in local authority income for October 2003 to March 2004 have again been transferred. The transfer was calculated using DWP's caseload information and divided between local authorities on the basis of their own caseload returns. This transfer included a one-off amount for the costs of administering the change. The transfer for future years is yet to be agreed with DWP.

Scottish Executive Funding

Tommy Sheridan (Glasgow) (SSP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will continue to fund the ME Association following the closure of its Glasgow office and, if so, whether the funding will be ring-fenced for Scottish activities or whether it will allocate funding to an alternative charity that provides services to people with ME in Scotland.

Mr Tom McCabe: The Executive is currently discussing grant funding and proposals for the future with the ME Association. The Executive's grant funding, to any voluntary organisation, can only be used for activities in Scotland or of direct benefit to Scottish residents.

Scottish Executive Funding

Tommy Sheridan (Glasgow) (SSP): To ask the Scottish Executive what information it has concerning redundancies following the closure of the ME Association's Scottish office and whether Scottish Executive funds were used for any redundancy payments.

Mr Tom McCabe: It would not be appropriate for the Executive to divulge information provided in confidence by an autonomous voluntary organisation. However, I can confirm that that Scottish Executive grant funds have not been used by the ME Association for the purpose of making any redundancy payments.

Student Loans

Brian Adam (Aberdeen North) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what the interest rates set for student loans were in each year since 2000; who sets the interest rates; whether it has the power to vary the rates, and how changes in the rates are announced.

Mr Jim Wallace: The interest rates for each year since 2000 are as follows:

  


2000

2.6%



2001

2.3%



2002

1.3%



2003

3.1%



  The value of outstanding student loan amounts is uprated annually, by the Student Loans Company, in line with inflation in order to maintain the value of the amount borrowed constant in real terms. The method of calculation is set out in part V of the Education (Student Loans) (Scotland) Regulations 2000 as amended. The new rates are announced by a press release and on borrowers' annual account statement.

Teachers

Brian Adam (Aberdeen North) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what discussions it has had with teaching unions regarding flexibility in the use of teachers as part of the primary/secondary interface.

Peter Peacock: The partnership agreement for a better Scotland contains a commitment to increase the number of specialists working across the primary secondary boundary by 2007. The Schools Scotland Code 1956 sets out the qualifications required to teach in the primary and secondary sectors. A consultation on the future of the Code was held in 1999. The then Deputy Minister for Education and Young People, in response to question S1W-30420 on 9 October 2002, announced the repeal of the code in 2 phases on 9 October 2002. Teacher unions were consulted at all stages of the process.

  All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at

  http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search..

Water Charges

Richard Lochhead (North East Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what the average water bill for small businesses in (a) Scotland and (b) each local authority area was in each of the last 10 years.

Ross Finnie: This is an operational matter for Scottish Water. I have asked Dr Jon Hargreaves the Chief Executive of Scottish Water to respond. His response is as follows:

  The average water bill for small businesses is not available, though we can use the size of the bill as a proxy for the size of the business, with a threshold of £600 or less approximating to a small business. The average bill raised by Scottish Water from customers with bills less than £600 in 2001-02 was £225, in 2002-03 was £260 and in 2003-04 was £335. The information for earlier years is not available.

Water Charges

Alex Neil (Central Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will introduce a new water charging structure for business users that rebalances the structure through reducing fixed standing charges whilst increasing volumetric charges.

Ross Finnie: As I said in answer to question S2W-2537 on 25 September 2003, I am currently considering how best to take forward the recommendation for a public consultation on the principles of charging, and I believe that a public debate on these principles, during the course of the next year, could provide one of the building blocks for the next strategic review of charges. One issue to be considered in such a consultation would be the balance of fixed and volumetric charges.

  All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at:

  http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

Water Charges

Des McNulty (Clydebank and Milngavie) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it was made aware of the range of potential increases arising out of new arrangements for water bills.

Ross Finnie: The Charges Scheme for 2003-04 was agreed by Scottish Water and the Water Industry Commissioner within the revenue cap set by ministers. Only if there had not been agreement on the charges scheme, and Scottish ministers had been called upon to decide on the annual scheme of charges, would the Executive have requested a detailed assessment. Generally the impacts on individual customers are a matter for Scottish Water and the Water Industry Commissioner.

Water Charges

Des McNulty (Clydebank and Milngavie) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it is considering any further measures to ease the consequences of increases in water bills for business customers.

Ross Finnie: We await the outcome of the current discussion between Scottish Water and the Water Industry Commissioner on the Scheme of Charges for 2004-05, which we expect to conclude in the next month or so.

Water Charges

Des McNulty (Clydebank and Milngavie) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive by how much it expects non-domestic water and sewerage bills to decrease following the introduction of competition into the sector, as referred to in the draft Water Services (Scotland) Bill, and whether some bills to small businesses could increase as a result of competition.

Ross Finnie: Under the proposals outlined in the Executive's consultation on the draft Water Services (Scotland) Bill, non-household charges will reflect the services that retailers offer to non-household customers and customers' willingness to pay for these services.

Water Charges

Campbell Martin (West of Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive whether sections 31, 49 or 51 of the Water Industry (Scotland) Act 2002 offer any scope to Scottish Water to take cognisance of whether the level of charges levied by the company would have a detrimental impact on the ability of small businesses to continue to operate and whether Scottish Water has authority and power under that act to enter into agreement with an individual or company with regard to determining the charges to be made for Scottish Water's services irrespective of the level of charges agreed by the Scottish Executive.

Ross Finnie: It is for Scottish Water to ensure that its actions comply with all the duties placed upon it by the Water Industry (Scotland) Act 2002 and by all other legislation. Were the manner in which it discharges any of its duties to be challenged legally, it would be for the courts, not the Executive, to determine whether it had acted in accordance with statute.

Water Services

Campbell Martin (West of Scotland) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive what the reasons were for the inclusion of sections 31, 49 and 51 in the Water Industry (Scotland) Act 2002.

Ross Finnie: Section 31 is based on section 76(1) to (4) and (8) of the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994, as amended by section 13 of, and Part II of Schedule 3 to, the Water Industry Act 1999. It is included in the act to ensure that the duties placed on the former water and sewerage authorities in terms of making charges schemes apply to Scottish Water as the successor to the authorities.

  Section 49 is based on section 65(2)(a)(i) and (ii) of the 1994 Act. It is included in the act to ensure that the duties placed on the former water and sewerage when discharging their functions under the Sewerage (Scotland) Act 1968 and the Water (Scotland) Act 1980, to have had regard to the needs and interests of customers and potential customers, especially those who had special needs because of a medical condition, or who lived in rural areas, apply to Scottish Water as the successor to the authorities, but with the additional provision that it refers to disability and remote areas, as well as medical conditions and rural areas.

  Section 51 is included to place a duty on Scottish Water to act in the way best calculated to contribute to the achievement of sustainable development, where doing so does not run counter to the performance of any of its other statutory functions.

Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body

Holyrood Project

Mr Brian Monteith (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Con): To ask the Presiding Officer on how many occasions heating, plumbing or other similar contractors at the new Parliament building have removed fitting, piping and related fixtures and replaced them as a result of design changes and whether the cost of such work can be quantified.

Mr George Reid: The Convener of the Holyrood Progress Group has informed me that the policy of the group and of the Holyrood Project Team is to keep design changes to a minimum. However, it is inevitable that some changes will be required in any project of this complexity and scale. Detailed information about the number of changes that have been required is not readily available, and the provision of such information would involve a significant amount of staff time.